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itwbennett writes "Speaking at the launch of his Japan Renewable Energy Foundation, Masayoshi Son, founder and CEO of Softbank, outlined a plan to rebuild Japan's energy infrastructure. Son said the country could shift to renewable energy sources for 60 percent of its electricity requirements over the next two decades. He called for a 2 trillion yen (US$26 billion) 'super grid' across the country, and underwater off the coast, that would zip electricity around cheaply and efficiently to meet demand."

I don't want this guy anywhere near any real important infrastructure, his network is a fucking joke. Massive amounts of dead spots, slow as shit(esp. when compared to his competitors) internet speed etc. The guy obviously either doesn't know anything about building cell networks or doesn't give a shit. However he DOES spend I would estimate at least 2-3x as much as his competitors do on advertising. So maybe that is what he is planning, a massive ad campaign for renewable energy without anything concrete to show for it.

Reminds me of T. Boone Pickens. He was all for wind power when he was asking [wikipedia.org] the government for a right-of-way which would also have the convenient side-effect of allowing him to build a huge pipleline infrastructure for his large water holdings (making him a fortune). When he didn't get this right-of-way, suddenly he stopped being a big fan of wind power for some reason. Today you'll hear not a peep from him about it.

....hardware isn't your area of expertise, Mr. Son. Japan needs nuclear power, it is even less suited to wind & solar than other places, and has practically no fossil fuels. However, nuclear energy can be cleaner, safer, and more efficient than it is, by the use of molten salts for cooling and fuel delivery. The best example of this are Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors...see http://www.EnergyFromThorium.com

What could possibly go wrong and why am I reminded of the old proposal for liquid sodium cooled nuclear reactors in submarines?

It's working out pretty well in Europe [wikipedia.org], and the Japanese have the advantage of learning from others' mistakes.

As for the submarines I'm not sure; why does underwater cable that's chemically and radiologically benign and miles away from anyone sound as dangerous as a can of irradiated liquid metal that's bad enough before it touches water?

Ever heard of Chernobyl, which nearly made the whole of Europe inhabitable, required 600,000 "liquidators" to be mobilised to build a cover on top of the reactor (most of which died of severe radiation poisoning less than 20 years later),

I lived in less than 100km to the North from Chernobyl power plant, and my health is better than one of most people posting here.

The scale of Chernobyl disaster was massively inflated for political reasons, and to promote the policy of replacing nuclear power plants with less efficient coal-burning ones, that you see now in Europe.

bankrupted the USSR (it cost hundred of billions of modern dollars),

It didn't, because government was on both sides of all contracts related to the cleanup. It's not US, where contractor companies gorge on money thrown at them by the government every time there is any excuse for doing so.